Toffee Curls

I didn’t realize

The fragile glass vase

That is our living

No caution

Sticker to warn us

Of our eventual shattering

I didn’t realize

That life could be so delicate

Until yours became broken pieces

From the green couch beside me

We would finger-draw on each other’s backs

Flies buzzing around half-eaten popcorn kernels

Watching talking heads

On the screen, blabbering

But we weren’t really listening

The wind would blow against your toffee curls

As we cycled to the sandwich shop

Laughing over first-grade memories

Like the time we sang off-key on stage

Nail-bitten fingers gripping the mic

As our wide-eyed class looked a tad horrified

Now finger-drawing on the cushions

Writing this piece before it hits paper

I notice even the flies that seemed to love us

Have lost their flicker, only one remaining

I’m sorry, I squashed it

Guilt as my palm rubs against it’s squishy mass

I know you loved life

I know you loved preserving it

But that seems hard to do when you’re gone

Out the window I see kids playing

Splashing in gross rain puddles

Muddy, filthy, but somehow they smile

Laughter is a strange sound

Natural, breakable

Like the risk of their bike racing

One’s gleam of eye

In response to joy

One’s sunshine

Could be another’s misery

I forget other people’s sorrows

Maybe it’s too hard to remember all the time

One’s joy

Is not as guaranteed

As another’s

Somewhere in the world

Someone is grieving

But somewhere in the world

Someone is celebrating

For others to be born

And what’s broken finds its glue